This invention relates to optical communication systems and more particularly to an optoelectronic device with optical elements integrated thereon.
Optical couplers are now used to communicate optical signals over short and long distances between, for example, two computers, two circuit boards in one computer, and even two different chips on the same circuit board.
As integrated device technology continues to place more circuitry and photonic devices on a single wafer or chip, it becomes possible to build complete systems on a single wafer or chip. For these devices to be the most efficient, optical communication needs to occur between the individual photonic devices.
Present structures for optical communication between two chips on the same circuit board utilize short optical fiber or couplers between the chips. However, these devices have limited capability with respect to the number of such communication links due to the size of the connecting devices. This problem is even worse for optical communications between separate photonic devices on the same chip.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide an optoelectronic device with optical communication between different photonic devices on the optoelectronic device.
It is a further object of this invention to provide an optoelectronic device with passive optical elements integrated thereon that provide communications and processing of the optical signal.
It is a further object of this invention to provide a method for making an optoelectronic device with passive optical elements integrated thereon.
This invention results from the realization that a more efficient optoelectronic device is achieved by optically coupling data from one area of a chip to another area of the same chip.
The present invention provides an optoelectronic device including a substrate with transceiver circuitry; a transceiver array, including a plurality of photonic devices, attached to the substrate and in electrical communication with the transceiver circuitry; and a plurality of passive optical components attached to the transceiver array, the passive optical elements optically connecting at least two of the photonic devices to each other. The substrate may be silicon or other suitable material. The photonic devices may be transmitters and receivers and may be located individually or interdigitated. The passive optical elements may also provide optical signal processing.
This invention further provides an optoelectronic device including a substrate with transceiver circuitry; a transceiver array with a plurality of photonic devices; a plurality of passive optical element modules, each passive optical element module including a plurality of passive optical elements attached to the transceiver array to optically connect at least two of the photonic devices to each other. The substrate may be silicon or other suitable material.
This invention further provides a method for making an optoelectronic device with an integrated array of passive optical elements by mounting an array of passive optical elements on a substrate and flip-chip bonding the array of optical elements to a substrate containing driver and receiver circuitry and an array of active optical elements.